I have a problem that i'm kind of upset about and was hoping someone could offer some help. I've made sparkling mead a few times with pasture champagne yeast with excellent results. However, it always came out a little on the dry side and too alchoholic for my taste. So for my last two batches i decided to switch yeasts for a change. I used a montrachet yeast with 16 lbs of honey in a 6 gallon batch. i let it ferment and bulk age for 4 months racking twice, and then bottled it with 8 oz of corn sugar to prime. i let it condition in the bottle for 6 months before deciding to try it. when i finally did crack one open i was very dissapointed, the mead tasted wonderful but was almost FLAT! It had only the smallest hint of sparkle. So my questions are where did i go wrong and how can i fix it? i'm unhappy enough with the result that i would be willing to open all the bottles, dump them back into the bucket and do some work on it. Thanks in advance for your help.

ThistyViking

03-09-2004, 09:48 PM

Sparkling Sweet anything is hard to do unless you force carbonate.

Otherwise you will always be gambling on either Flat or Bottle bombs for your result.You can use Champagne yeast for lower alchohol content by using a lower S.G. but you still get the same very dry result.

Sparkling Perry is wonderful BTW.

yabb_unknown_usr

03-10-2004, 09:49 AM

Is there anything i can do to fix/improve the current flat batch? It tastes so good i just dont want to let it go!

ThistyViking

03-10-2004, 11:10 PM

There are things that could be done... you could get one of those little mini kegging systems that home brew shops sell. Pour several bottle into the keg, attach the little CO2 cartridge.

On a larger scale you could go the Corney keg route with larger CO2 canisters and 5 gallon kegs. These will do a better Job at Carbonating IMO.

Montgomery

03-11-2004, 01:42 AM

I was thinking about opening the bottles, dumping them into a bucket, repitching with champagne yeast, and immediately rebottling. Do you think this would work?